


Every Night a Party

by merriman



Category: Highlander: The Series
Genre: Dingy Motels, Don't copy to another site, Gen, Warehouse Parties, Well-Meant Advice From Your Elders, seedy bars
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-13
Updated: 2019-12-13
Packaged: 2021-02-26 00:02:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,862
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21774145
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/merriman/pseuds/merriman
Summary: Richie's heading north for a while. He meets a less nihilistic Gregor Powers on his way. There's not a whole lot to do in the middle of nowhere, so why not crash a party?
Comments: 18
Kudos: 30
Collections: Highlander Secret Santa (ShortCuts) 2019





	Every Night a Party

**Author's Note:**

  * For [LadySilver](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadySilver/gifts).



> CW: A not insignificant amount of drinking is involved.

The bar looked seedy, and that was being generous. The flickering sign out front just said "Bar" and nothing else. Richie hadn't planned on stopping there, but he was a little low on gas and it was getting on towards sunset. There was a motel and a gas station with a convenience store sharing the lot with the bar, so that worked out pretty well. He'd just make up the time the next day. Get up early and hit the road around dawn or something. Richie still wasn't too fond of mornings but he had to admit, mornings on the road, with the mountains ahead of him, were pretty spectacular. 

First things first: Check into the motel. He'd learned that the hard way a couple of times in spots like this. If you didn't grab a room when you could, you might well end up camping out in the parking lot or just pushing on overnight to avoid sleeping on the ground. Either way, he'd rather have a bed. Even if it was a lumpy roadside motel bed. The kid at the front desk was maybe 20 and deep in conversation on his phone when Richie walked in. 

"No, I mean, I'm stuck here until midnight." He paused and Richie was about to try and interrupt when the conversation picked up again. "Text me if it's still worth going at like, 11. No, I can't leave early. You want to explain to my mom how this place got trashed cause I went to party? Last time I did that I was on the graveyard shift for a month." Another pause. "Well then you come work graveyard shift at my parents crappy motel and I'll go party without you."

Now Richie did interrupt. This sort of back and forth could probably go on forever.

"Hey man, I just want to check in," he said. 

The kid looked up and sighed. "Hang on," he said. "Oh, not you, sorry. Shawn, shut up and hang on, I've got to work." He tossed his phone onto the counter and Richie could hear a voice coming through it still. He made out the words 'warehouse' and 'kegs' before the voice stopped, presumably realizing that it was talking to no one.

"Checking in?"

"Yeah." Richie handed over his ID, which the kid barely glanced at, and then forked over cash for the night. 

The kid lobbed a key in Richie's direction. "Room 22. Ground level, over by the dumpsters, but don't worry, the smell doesn't reach the room," he said before he picked up his phone again and went back to his conversation without another look in Richie's direction.

The dumpsters were easy enough to find and Richie wrinkled his nose at the smell as he approached, but the kid had been right. Somehow it didn't invade the room. Not much, anyhow. Had to be the way the wind blew. The room itself wasn't too bad. No bedbugs that Richie could see evidence of and there was soap in the bathroom. A quick shower later, Richie was headed back out and over to the bar. If he was going to spend the night here, he wasn't going to spend it in the motel room and it wasn't like the kid had invited him to whatever party his friend was trying to get him to go to.

The bar was decently full with what looked like a mix of regulars and folks taking a break from the road. Richie got himself a beer at the bar and a seat where he could see one of the screens showing a hockey game. He'd just settled in, ready to spend the evening drinking shitty beer and cheering on whatever team everyone else was cheering on, when he felt that pull of tension in his neck, then the buzz of Immortality closing in. Over the years he'd thought about his instincts when he felt someone else nearby. If he knew who it was that was easier - friends you stuck around for and enemies you dealt with one way or another. But the unknown? You had about fifteen seconds maybe to weigh the possibilities. It could be a stranger, and maybe they were looking for a fight and didn't care how much trouble that caused. Maybe they were looking for a fight, but had the decency to want to avoid trouble. Maybe they were just passing by and wanted to be left alone. That was the norm, actually. Richie hadn't really anticipated that, after spending so much time around Mac. He'd expected everyone to be after his head at first. But no. Most others just wanted to get on with their lives just like he did. That had been an immense relief. 

Still, right that second, there was the question of who was walking into the bar. Richie turned just slightly so he could see the front door and when it opened he almost laughed out loud. Gregor Powers wasn't on his list of favorite people in the world, but he wasn't exactly an enemy. 

"Richie Ryan!" Greg said, strolling up to the bar and clapping him on the shoulder. "Joined our ranks, I take it?"

Richie just shook his head and took a pull from his beer. "Yeah, but you had to know that'd happen."

"Nah," Greg said. "I did, but it's not something everyone pays attention to, you know? Anyhow, no hard feelings? I mean, I wasn't really trying to kill you. I figured it'd be fine. You'd be fine."

"You mean to tell me you thought for more than a few seconds what might happen if one of your stunts got me dead?" Richie asked, turning on his stool to face Greg.

Greg, for his part, hesitated, then shrugged. "Didn't put all that much thought into it, no, but I did know. And I did figure you had MacLeod around whenever it happened, whether it was with me or not. I wasn't exactly in the right shape for a student at the time."

Now here was another important question: Did Richie give Greg more grief over something that hadn't happened but could have, or did he let it go? Another look at Greg, who was now ordering a beer and sitting down next to him, and Richie decided to let it go. It wasn't worth the argument.

"Well that's for damn sure," he agreed. "Anyhow, it didn't happen. I got shot a month later."

"Hell of a way to go," Greg sighed. "But hey, you did okay. Let me buy you a drink? Or hey, a couple. I figure I owe you."

Richie nodded. "Sure. Let's drink."

An hour later, they'd grabbed a booth in a corner and had done a couple of rounds of shots. The waitress was clearly keeping an eye on them, but brought them a third round without questioning them.

"You know when I checked in, the kid at the desk was talking to a friend about some party. I felt like I was a million years old," Richie said as he picked up the shot glass.

"You should have invited yourself!" Greg told him. "You still look like you're nineteen. You could get away with it."

"No way," Richie said. "I'm 45! Last time I looked up my old friends they all had like, car payments and back problems."

"That's the thing about being Immortal, Richie. None of that shit matters for us. You've got to let it go. Listen, I'm over 300 years old. You know what my old friends have? Graves, if they're lucky."

"Wow, well, that's cheerful," Richie told him before tossing back the shot.

"You can't think of it like that," Greg said before drinking. "I mean, what else would they have? They were all mortal. You'll get it once you hit your first hundred. It's tough to accept before then. You're still marking your life against mortal lives. And if there's one thing I've gotten back since you last saw me, it's an appreciation for their lives. But their lives aren't our lives. Why limit yourself like that? Why say 'I'm 45, I can't go party like I'm 19!' when you might as well be 19. Or 200. It doesn't make a difference."

Richie considered the three shot glasses in front of him. And the two beer bottles. And the same in front of Greg, who was three hundred years his senior somehow. 

"Doesn't seem to make a difference to you," Richie said, nodding to Greg, who grinned in response.

"If you're thinking to yourself 'What about Duncan MacLeod?' then just stop," Greg told him. "Look, he's a great guy, taught me well enough, but he's also Mr. Responsibility. Always has been, always will be. Probably was when he was a teenager too. That's just who he is. But that's what I'm saying! He is who he is, no matter how old he is. He's not sitting around thinking 'Now that I'm over 400, I can't go acting like I'm 60.' He acts like himself. You've just got to figure out who Richie Ryan is, no matter how many years you've got under your belt."

That's just what Richie had been trying to do. He'd been trying to do it for the past twenty-five years. Still a work in progress, apparently.

"Yeah, well, I think I should call it a night," Richie said, trying to add up his bar tab in his head. 

"Man, you _are_ 45," Greg said, laughing. He got up and headed for the bar to settle their tabs before Richie could stop him. "Come on," he called over once he'd paid up. "I've got to see if that motel has any rooms left."

Richie tossed some cash on the table for the tip, then followed Greg out. Most likely the last few rooms had been taken in the time they'd spent drinking.

Sure enough, when they walked into the motel office the kid who'd been there earlier was sitting behind the counter, feet up, phone in hand while he sent rapid-fire texts. 

"Got any more rooms?" Greg asked. The kid didn't even look up, he just shook his head.

"Full up," he said, eyes still on his phone. "There's another motel fifteen miles down. They might be full too. You could call 'em."

Greg shrugged. "It's cool. Thanks."

"No problem," the kid said. He hadn't looked up once and still didn't when Greg left the office and Richie followed.

"Hey, you can always sleep on the floor of my room," Richie offered.

"Oh, but my back!" Greg said. "Hey, you mentioned that kid was talking about a party. What do you say we go find it?"

"You want to crash some warehouse party?" Richie asked. "I swear, Greg, if this ends up like last time…"

"Hey! I'm not saying we jump our bikes through a ring of fire or anything. Come on, how long has it been since you did anything like this?"

It had been a little over twenty-five years. Even when Richie had been an actual teenager he hadn't really partied much. Okay, he'd partied a little, but he'd also been learning how to not get arrested while doing very arrestable things that kept you busy on Friday nights. Then too, there was partying with your friends and there was going to parties and they weren't necessarily the same thing.

"I can see you overthinking it. Come on, Richie. We're adults. Immortal adults. We can always leave if it's pathetic or if something goes wrong. We have our own rides."

Yeah. Greg had a point. Richie had to admit to that.

As it turned out, it wasn't hard to find the place. It wasn't that big a town and there wasn't a whole lot else going on. When they drove up there were a bunch of kids smoking in front of the warehouse. They barely acknowledged Richie and Greg as they walked by and Richie heard them complaining about some professor who'd failed two of them on their final. That was something he might do some day. Not fail a class - that, he'd done - but college. 

A group in front of them had brought an extra keg and Richie and Greg slipped in behind them while that got handled. Before Richie knew it, Greg had disappeared into the crowd and he was on his own. It was fine. It was more than fine. It was great. No one to hassle him about acting too old or whatever. The music wasn't bad and someone had gone to the trouble to set up some lights and no one questioned Richie when he grabbed a beer.

So maybe Richie wasn't nineteen anymore. He definitely wasn't a typical 45 year old either. No one was looking at him like he didn't belong there, aside from a couple of kids asking if he was new in town, and then not listening when he gave them a flimsy response of just arriving for the summer. It didn't matter. So long as he didn't look like he was going to shut the thing down and he wasn't being a creep, he was just one of the crowd. It was a bizarre feeling, to be young again. Which, Richie admitted, was flat out ridiculous. He _was_ young by Immortal standards.

He was on his fourth beer - avoiding the horrific mixed drinks the guys at the table full of booze were creating - when he spotted Greg again. It must have been past midnight because Greg was talking to the kid from the motel, apparently off shift. A couple of other guys were with them and everyone was laughing. Richie waited until the kids had walked away, then headed over.

"New friends?" he asked.

Greg grinned at him. "Kid doesn't even remember me. Of course, he never looked at me, so why would he? He was telling us all about his shitty job at the motel. Your room, by the way, was the last one."

"Lucky me, then," Richie said. He was about to say something else when he saw Greg's entire face shift, the smile disappearing and his jaw tensing as he watched something nearby. Richie turned to look but all he saw was two guys both put something in their pockets.

"Come on," Greg said. "Let's get out of here." 

They weren't far from the door but there were more people still coming in, so it took a bit for them to get out and to their bikes. Richie was putting his helmet on when he saw that Greg had his phone out and was making a call.

"Did you just call the cops on that party?" Richie asked. "Seriously?"

"Seriously," Greg said. "Hey, a party is all fun and games until someone gets fucked up."

Greg put his own helmet on and peeled out onto the road ahead of Richie. They were back at the motel not long after that and Richie figured he'd make good on his offer to share the room with Greg. They didn't even bother to stop at the office. Richie just parked his bike down at the end of the row near the dumpsters and waited for Greg to do the same before unlocking the door.

It was a full ten minutes before either of them said anything. Richie wasn't sure what to say after Greg's big speech about having a good time and living like the years didn't matter. Eventually Greg spoke first.

"You know I started practicing medicine again after the last time you saw me. Worked as a paramedic for a while, then got my M.D. again. Third time? Fourth? Anyhow, it's a good way to get some perspective, you know? We may be Immortal, we can do whatever dumbass things we want to do and we'll walk away just fine 99% of the time. Mortals? They don't have that luxury."

"Yeah, I get it," Richie said. "You sure you want to take on that responsibility though? Calling the cops every time you see someone doing something stupid?"

Greg shrugged and started to unpack a sleeping bag he'd taken off his bike. "Not every time, no. But if I can keep someone out of the ER? Sure. I'll do it. Call it penance or whatever."

The next morning Richie was up around dawn but Greg had him beat and was already dressed and packing his things.

"Where are you headed next?" Richie asked. "I'm going north for a bit, wouldn't mind company."

"Sorry. I'm on my way south. You are looking at Seacouver General's new head of pediatrics," Greg told him.

Richie stared at him. "You're shitting me. You, the guy who tried to run me and my bike off a dock, are a pediatrician."

Greg shrugged. "What can I say? Going back to medicine is what keeps me from pulling dumbass stunts all the time. Taking care of kids keeps me a part of the world. We all have crises, Richie. Sometimes that's what it takes to focus. I mean, if you're an asshole like me, it is. We change, sure, but it's not age that does it. It's experience."

~end~


End file.
